Providing Professional Supervision For Staff

Task 1.

1.1 Evaluate theories and models that underpin the practice of professional supervision

Professional supervision is a crucial component in any organization. The practice ensures quality service delivery to the clients and stakeholders while also enhancing the quality of life for other workers. Supervision involves the process of giving a worker the responsibility to work with or under another staff to ensure the realization of personal, professional, and organisational goals and enhance service delivery to the clients or users (Snowdon et al., 2017). For this objective to become a reality, supervision must meet three conditions which include respectful relationship, occur in a safe environment, and part of the organizational culture. 

In the health and care space, supervision is crucial in professional development. It is the process through which professional health practioners mentoring novice workers into experts. While it is essential in enhancing performance, the overall objective of supervision is not showcasing power and authority over others (Butterworth, 2022). Rather, it is an opportunity for the supervision to support the supervisee gain confidence in their field, learn new skills, and gain experience. To ensure proper professional supervision, different models and theories have come up. These models support the practice of professional supervision for healthcare staff to enhance their skills and performance. Some of the models include:

Developmental models

The development models focus on the belief that humans are on a constant learning and development trajectory. They argue that a person has several stages of development in the professional journey. Each stage has its unique skills and character which should guide the supervision practice. According to these concepts, healthcare workers move from novice to expert stages in their professional life. The stage of each supervisee are essential in determining the nature of support and guidance they require (Mitchell et al., 2020). For instance, a staff at the novice level is likely to have limited skills and low confidence. The one at intermediate level have high confidence and skills and seeking to stop depending on the supervisor. The supervisee at the expert stage have all necessary skills and can easily resolve problems without much supervision.  In this regard, supervisors using the development models must have clear knowledge of the supervisee current stage of development to offer them the right feedback, support, and developing a plan help the supervisee progress to the next level. 

The first example of developmental models is the Integrated Development Model (IDM) by Stoltenberg et al. (1998). This model states that professionals has three stages which are self-others awareness, motivation, and autonomy (Salvador, 2016).  The supervisor’s role is to help a supervisee go through these levels in the course of their professional life.  A supervisee at the self-other awareness stage are students or trainees who have high motivation, has a limited awareness of themselves and the clients. Also, they have fear of evaluation and anxious. These supervisee depend on supervisor for direction. Their desire is to do the right thing and learn the best approaches for working with clients and patients (Cigrand & Wood, 2011). As such, the supervisor need to provide them with high levels of structure, positive reinforcement and avoid confronting them directly. Motivation level is the second stage of professional growth in this model. Supervisees at this stage display high self-other awareness, strong confidence but unstable motivation, and autonomy-dependency conflict in regard to supervision. A supervisor for supervisee at this level should consider facilitative and less moralising approaches (Stoltenberg et al., 2014). They should consider observation, role playing, and interpreted dynamics as their supervisory mechanisms. Autonomy is the third level and last stage in the IDM. At this stage, the supervisee have developed a degree of independence.  Their self-awareness have developed and started to have a personalized approach to service delivery. They also has the ability to focus on clients while working on their personal reactions and responses as well as demonstrate ability to make client/patient decisions. Supervisors overseeing professionals at this level should use strategies that support professional identity development, consistency, and enhancing consultation relationship with minimal evaluation (Shelton & Zazzarino, 2020). Their roles should be facilitative, confrontive, and conceptual while engaging the supervisee in activities such as peer and group supervision and strive for integration. Hence, supervisors must pay attention to these stages to enhance professional supervision. 

The next development model is one by Loganbill, Hardy, & Delworth that focus on four elements of supervision which are supervisor, supervisee, supervision context/environment, and their relationship. This model established three stages of supervisee development which are stagnation, confusion, and integration (Salvador, 2016). Stagnation stage is similar to that of self-other awareness in the IDM model where the supervisee highly depend on supervisor for support and guidance. Confusion stage is where the supervisee has expanded clinical skills and understanding the related terms (Stoltenberg et al., 2014). Conflict, disorganized, and instability are the common aspect among the supervisees as their feelings of incompetence and high competence fluctuate. The last stage is integration where supervisees has a stronger clinical aptitude that allow them to be flexible. They also have realistic view on supervision and understand its limitations. A supervisor applying this model should be aware of the varying areas of competence in their supervision process. 

Scaffolding 

Scaffolding model is common in the professional supervision. This model involves offering temporary support and encouraging professionals to use their skills and knowledge in resolving. It is an approach where professionals learn and grow through one-on-one guidance of the supervisor (Anderson, 2015). This aspect involve provision of support and guidance to enable the supervisee perform specific tasks that they could not do without the hand of the supervisor. Vygotsky developed this model arguing that supervisors should provide the guidance and support structure to help supervisee move to the next stage of their professional development (Daughhetee, Puleo & Thrower, 2010).  This model seeks to move healthcare students and trainees from what they know to what they didn’t know through application of various aspects such as coaching, modelling, pear learning and workshops. 

Integrative models

These models follow an integrative approach in that they encourage application of more than one concepts and techniques in approaching supervision. These models consist an integration of two approaches which are technical eclecticism and theoretical integration (Mitchell et al., 2020).  Examples of these models are Bernard’s Discrimination Model and Holloway’s Systems Approach.